Flood zones: Puerto Rico’s two maps and which one governs
Puerto Rico uses the FIRM maps and, since 2018, the ABFE maps. For building or substantially improving a property, the more restrictive of the two always applies.
August 15, 2026
Agency
Junta de Planificación de Puerto Rico (JP)
The body that sets land use policy in Puerto Rico. It adopts the Land Use Plan and reviews municipal Territorial Ordering Plans, and through its Office of Geology and Hydrogeology it coordinates the National Flood Insurance Program and certifies federal consistency with the Coastal Zone Management Program.
Agency's official siteGuides related to this agency
Coastal zone: how far it reaches and when you need certification
It runs 1,000 metres inland and 9 nautical miles out to sea. A project with a federal permit or federal funds inside it needs certification from the Junta.
August 15, 2026
School zone: 100 metres, 200 radial, and which businesses cannot be there
Act 84-1988 defines the school zone as 100 linear metres and 200 radial, and limits noxious businesses to operating outside school hours.
August 24, 2026
Registry of available public properties
Act 19-2011 requires four public entities to publish their properties in a GIS registry with free access for the general public.
August 30, 2026
The elevation certificate: who signs it and why it is required
Without this document no construction permit is approved in a regulatory flood zone. Only a surveyor signs it.
September 3, 2026
Substantial damage and improvement: the 50% rule in a flood zone
If repairing or improving costs half the structure’s value, your home must meet the full flood regulation.
September 3, 2026
What the Planning Board charges for each procedure
The fee schedule of Administrative Order JP-OA-2019-01: consultations, certifications, public hearings, copies and GIS data.
September 3, 2026
Dry floodproofing: the alternative to elevating the building
For non-residential structures in a flood zone there is an alternative to elevating, with its own certificate and its own numbers.
September 3, 2026
Complaint about unpermitted work or a business
Only someone with a proprietary interest or an abutter may file, and if the place cannot be found, it is filed away.
September 3, 2026
Permit fines: how the amount charged is calculated
A $500 base or double the permit cost, multiplied by severity, and each day it continues is a separate violation.
September 3, 2026
Planning Board permit audit: what it reviews and how it ends
The Board audits final determinations and permits already issued; it can end in a fine, a stoppage or revocation.
September 4, 2026
Reconsideration before the Planning Board: twenty days and what follows
A jurisdictional term of 20 calendar days, six mandatory contents, and 30 days for the Court of Appeals.
September 4, 2026
Administrative hearing before the Planning Board: how it is set, held and decided
Fifteen days’ notice, a public hearing, the rules of evidence do not apply, and suspending it costs you the terms.
September 4, 2026
Going to the Court of First Instance over works or a permit
Injunction, mandamus or declaratory judgment to stop, revoke or demolish; but filing kills the administrative complaint.
September 4, 2026
Master Plan: how it is filed, adopted and how long it lasts
Twelve initial contents, twelve filing requirements, a public hearing, a Governor’s Executive Order and five years’ validity.
September 4, 2026
School zone: how it is designated and what happens to businesses already there
Inside the zone no permit issues without the Secretary of Education’s recommendation, deemed issued at thirty days if no objection comes.
September 4, 2026
Getting a property declared historic: the fifty years and the emergency designation
Anyone may request the nomination, and where short-term demolition threatens, an emergency designation valid for six months is available.
September 4, 2026
Overlaid zones: the map layer that changes what you may do on your lot
Tourist, historic, school, special planning, port and risk zones, plus special planning areas and natural and agricultural reserves.
September 4, 2026
My land has no qualification: what rules apply in a non-qualified area
Where there is no qualification map the PUTPR is the reference, and a one- or two-family house is permitted ministerially.
September 4, 2026
Changing a lot’s qualification: maps, maximum sizes and effective dates
Table 7.1’s maximum sizes by district, what is filed, and the fifteen days from publication to effect.
September 4, 2026
Public land transactions before the Planning Board
Who may promote one, what is filed, the four-year term, the single extension and how revocation is sought.
September 5, 2026
Residential districts R-B, R-I and R-U: what can be built and to what measurements
The minimum lot, width, occupation, density and yards of the three residential districts, and the uses that come only by exception.
September 5, 2026
R-C district: the business on the ground floor and the dwelling above
What the residential-commercial district allows and expressly prohibits, with the two parameter columns for high density and traditional urban centre.
September 5, 2026
Commercial districts C-L, C-I and C-C: which business fits in each
The ladder of the three commercial districts, the uses each reserves to the next, the lot and yard parameters, and the consulta for centres over 250,000 square feet.
September 5, 2026
Industrial districts I-E, I-L and I-P: the quarry, light industry and heavy industry
What each industrial district allows, the minimum lots of 8,000, 800 and 4,000 square metres, and the defect in the heavy-industry parameter table.
September 5, 2026
R-G Rural General district: what can be done on rural land
The uses the regulation allows on rural land, the twenty-five-cuerda minimum, and the cemetery and mobile-home exceptions.
September 5, 2026
Agricultural districts A-G and A-P: what is allowed on a farm and in an agricultural reserve
The fifty-cuerda segregation in a reserve, the fifty-metre buffer zone, the accessory uses and the ban on commercial advertising.
September 5, 2026
Institutional districts D-G and D-A: the land of institutions and of open spaces
How the general institutional district works, taking its parameters from other districts, and the open-area one, where occupation does not exceed two per cent.
September 5, 2026
Conservation districts A-B, C-R and P-R: the forest, the resource and what is untouchable
What each conservation district allows, the fifty metres around caves, the hundred-metre riparian strip and the five mangrove types.
September 5, 2026
R-E and P-P districts: the scenic route and the public beach
The panoramic route’s height and visibility rules, the petrol station’s five hundred metres, and what the regulation requires of a public beach.
September 5, 2026
If your lot is smaller than the district requires: the tables that do apply
How much may be occupied, what rear yard is left and when you may build up to the boundary, plus the conversion to basic dwelling units.
September 6, 2026
Height, mezzanines, exceptions and solar heater: the parameters that apply in every district
A nine-metre base height, twice the road’s width, when a mezzanine does not count as a storey and why every new house carries a solar water heater.
September 6, 2026
What may be done in agricultural reserves, natural reserves and the towns around El Yunque
The location consultation in special areas: who recommends, which criteria apply, which uses fit in R-G, A-P, A-B and C-R, and the 400-square-metre minimum lot.
September 6, 2026
Tourist residential districts RT-I and RT-A: what is allowed and on what parameters
Intermediate and high density in the Tourist Interest Zones, holiday mobile-home projects and the guest-house rules.
September 6, 2026
District C-T Tourist Commercial: commerce below, housing above and a gallery on the pavement
What is allowed in tourist commercial zones, the two intensity levels, the mandatory gallery and why a nightclub carries a public hearing.
September 6, 2026
District DTS: everything by location consultation, except one house per property
The district with no fixed parameter table: occupation and gross floor area are determined in light of the proposed development.
September 6, 2026
District C-H: the historic or archaeological value that is not in the Register
Which uses fit, why segregation is nearly impossible, and why every authorisation goes through the ICP’s or OECH’s recommendation.
September 6, 2026
District M "To Be Improved" and district R-EA for open spaces: two qualifications that limit building
One can be requalified when conditions change; the other keeps its open-space condition in perpetuity and admits no new construction.
September 6, 2026
Terraced houses: six units per building, ten if the façade changes
A 150-square-metre minimum lot, six metres of frontage per unit, and the front yard that rises to six metres if there is no parking on the lot.
September 6, 2026
Patio houses: two hundred and fifty square metres of lot and up to two families
The parameters of Table 8.2 of the Joint Regulation: sixty-five per cent occupation, one hundred and thirty gross floor area and three metres in each yard.
September 6, 2026
Apartment houses: yards, separation between buildings and loading bay
Fifty per cent occupation, yards of three metres or one fifth of the height, and one loading space per forty units above fifteen.
September 6, 2026
How many flats fit on a lot: the density and gross floor area tables
Square metres per basic dwelling unit by lot size and district, plus what happens to the density if the lot is later lotified.
September 6, 2026
Public access to the beaches: the metres the law requires and what nobody may close
Every project bordering the coast must provide public access, dedicate it by deed and leave a twenty-metre public strip from the maritime-terrestrial zone.
September 6, 2026
Segregating or developing in the coastal zone: the public street, the eleven metres and the parking
Lots fronting the coast are separated from the public strip by a street, accesses never drop below eleven metres, and public parking is mandatory.
September 6, 2026
Bathing resorts, marinas and camps on the coast: what the regulation demands
A bathing resort’s nine minimum facilities, the ban on segregating in coastal complexes and its only two exceptions.
September 6, 2026
Seafront condominiums: perpendicular to the coast and with public access alongside
Eleven or more dwellings are processed as an urbanisation, buildings are oriented not to block the view, and giving an access earns a gross floor area bonus.
September 6, 2026
How far back from the sea you must build: two and a half times the height
The 400-metre rule and the 2.5-times-height setback, the three urban exemptions, the concessions and the one-hour shadow study.
September 6, 2026
Roads, sewerage and qualification maps in the coastal zone
What a coastal public work must meet, and how far the qualification map reaches: nine nautical miles out to sea and one kilometre inland.
September 6, 2026
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